22-letter words containing s, a, y, o
- physiographic province — a geographic region in which climate and geology have given rise to an array of landforms different from those of surrounding regions.
- planetary transmission — A planetary transmission is a special form of geared drive in which the input and output shafts are on the same axis.
- play into the hands of — a dramatic composition or piece; drama.
- play one's cards right — a usually rectangular piece of stiff paper, thin pasteboard, or plastic for various uses, as to write information on or printed as a means of identifying the holder: a 3″ × 5″ file card; a membership card.
- pneumocystis pneumonia — a pulmonary infection caused by the protozoan Pneumocystis carinii, occurring as an opportunistic disease in persons with impaired immune systems, as AIDS victims. Abbreviation: PCP.
- potassium ferricyanide — a bright-red, crystalline, water-soluble, poisonous solid, K 3 Fe(CN) 6 , used chiefly in the manufacture of pigments, as Prussian blue, and of paper, especially blueprint paper.
- potassium ferrocyanide — a lemon-yellow, crystalline, water-soluble solid, K 4 Fe(CN) 6 ⋅3H 2 O, used chiefly in casehardening alloys having an iron base and in dyeing wool and silk.
- preestablished harmony — (in the philosophy of Leibnitz) synchronous operation of all monads, since their simultaneous creation, in accordance with the preexisting plan of God.
- probationary assistant — a teacher in the first probationary years
- process cinematography — cinematography in which the main or foreground action or scene is superimposed on or combined with simulated or separately filmed background action or scenery to produce special visual effects.
- prothonotary apostolic — a member of the first college of prelates of the Roman Curia.
- psychological thriller — book, movie: suspense story
- pulmonary tuberculosis — tuberculosis of the lungs.
- quantum chromodynamics — a quantum field theory that describes quarks and gluons and their interactions, with the color of the quarks playing a role analogous to that of electric charge. Abbreviation: QCD. Also called chromodynamics. Compare color (def 18).
- rheumatoid spondylitis — ankylosing spondylitis.
- rocky mountain oysters — mountain oyster.
- sapir-whorf hypothesis — a theory developed by Edward Sapir and Benjamin Lee Whorf that states that the structure of a language determines or greatly influences the modes of thought and behavior characteristic of the culture in which it is spoken.
- satisfiability problem — A problem used as an example in complexity theory. It can be stated thus: Given a Boolean expression E, decide if there is some assignment to the variables in E such that E is true. A Boolean expression is composed of Boolean variables, (logical) negation (NOT), (logical) conjunction (AND) and parentheses for grouping. The satisfiability problem was the first problem to be proved to be NP-complete (by Cook).
- schachter's hypothesis — (web) The observation that "Given two unrelated technical terms, an Internet search engine will retrieve only résumés". This was first formulated by Joshua Eli Schachter in about 1998, while poring over the uniformly irrelevant pages that resulted from a search he'd run on "+Perl +MAPI" in Altavista.
- secondary articulation — coarticulation (def 2).
- secondary spermatocyte — See under spermatocyte.
- secondary-articulation — concomitance of articulation, as in fro, ostensibly a succession of three discrete sounds but physically a single articulation (f-) blending into a coarticulation (-fr-), which blends into an articulation (-r-), which blends into a coarticulation (-ro-), which blends into an articulation (-o).
- secretary to the board — the secretary to the board of directors; company secretary
- see the light (of day) — to come into existence
- social security number — A Social Security number is a nine digit number that is given to U.S. citizens and to people living in the U.S. You need it to get a job, collect Social Security benefits and receive some government services.
- somatic nervous system — the section of the nervous system responsible for sensation and control of the skeletal muscles
- southern redbelly dace — any of the small, brightly colored North American freshwater cyprinids, especially Phoxinus oreas (northern redbelly dace) and P. erythrogaster (southern redbelly dace)
- spectrophotometrically — an instrument for making photometric comparisons between parts of spectra.
- spectroscopic analysis — the use of spectroscopy in determining the chemical or physical constitution of substances
- speculative philosophy — philosophy embodying beliefs insusceptible of proof and attempting to gain insight into the nature of the ultimate by intuitive or a priori means.
- spherical trigonometry — the branch of trigonometry that deals with spherical triangles.
- spinal accessory nerve — accessory nerve.
- student volunteer army — a students' voluntary organization that aims to undertake useful work in communities, founded in 2010 to help clear up after a damaging earthquake in Christchurch
- subjective probability — a measure or estimate of the degree of confidence one may have in the occurrence of an event, defined by subjective criteria
- subornation of perjury — the offense of bribing or otherwise persuading another to commit perjury.
- suffice it to say that — let us say no more than that; I shall just say that
- supplementary question — a question asked in Parliament by an MP during Questions to the Prime Minister
- sympathetic ophthalmia — inflammation of one eye due to injury or disease of the other eye.
- syntactic construction — a construction that has no bound forms among its immediate constituents. Compare morphologic construction.
- system account manager — (cryptography, operating system, security) (SAM) A password database stored as a registry file in Windows NT and Windows 2000. The System Account Manager (SAM) database stores users' passwords in a hashed format. Since a hash function is one-way, this provides some measure of security for the storage of the passwords. In an attempt to enhance the security of the SAM database against offline cracking, Microsoft introduced the SYSKEY utility in Windows NT 4.0.
- system management mode — (hardware) (SMM) A reduced power consumption state provided by some Intel microprocessors. When a CPU enters SMM it saves its current state in a special area of static RAM called SMRAM (System Management RAM) and then runs a program, also stored in SMRAM, the SMM handler. SMM is implemented in all Intel "SL" suffixed CPUs. In June 1993, Intel announced it was discontinuing its SL range and instead making all its current processors SL enhanced. See also Auto Idle.
- take a fancy to sb/sth — If you take a fancy to someone or something, you start liking them, usually for no understandable reason.
- take one's breath away — the air inhaled and exhaled in respiration.
- temporal lobe epilepsy — a type of seizure disorder produced by abnormal electric discharges in the temporal lobe of the brain, characterized by the occurrence of any of a variety of auras followed by a brief loss of consciousness with accompanying repetitive, automatic movements.
- temporal-lobe epilepsy — a type of seizure disorder produced by abnormal electric discharges in the temporal lobe of the brain, characterized by the occurrence of any of a variety of auras followed by a brief loss of consciousness with accompanying repetitive, automatic movements.
- that is/that is to say — You use that is or that is to say to indicate that you are about to express the same idea more clearly or precisely.
- the continental system — Napoleon's plan in 1806 to blockade Britain by excluding her ships from ports on the mainland of Europe
- the nature conservancy — a US charitable environmental organization, founded in 1951, that works to preserve the plants, animals, and natural communities by protecting the lands and waters they need to survive
- time-lapse photography — the photographing on motion-picture film of a slow and continuous process, as the growth of a plant, at regular intervals, especially by exposing a single frame at a time, for projection at a higher speed.
- to be a one-way street — if you describe an agreement or a relationship as a one-way street, you mean that only one of the sides in the agreement or relationship is offering something or is benefitting from it